So Damn Busy

School and work are combining forces to eat away at the small, and continually shrinking,entity that is my free time. As of late I haven't written anything because there has been nothing cool to write about to be honest. Besides working nights and getting a crap ton of work done for school before working those nights I haven't had much free time. But, there has been some time to watch some cool shows, finish a book, and see a great comedy show, guess I'll write about it.

I recently found that Anthony Bourdain's television show, No Reservations, has multiple seasons available for streaming through Netflix. I highly recommend checking out this series if you have Netflix and enjoy travel shows without the fluff and tourist stuff. Bourdain is a very likable host who has 28 years of cooking experience under his belt, multiple published books, and now his own show. The premise is simple and that is what makes the show so fascinating. Bourdain goes somewhere, he immerses himself in the local culture, and learns to eat and have fun like the locals do. That is the big message of the show, traveling somewhere and doing what locals do not tourist type activities. For instance, when Bourdain goes to Vegas he doesn't hang out on the strip he goes into Old Vegas or checks out up and coming restaurants. It's a great show and I highly recommend watching it for a different look at traveling.

As I mentioned I managed to find time to finish Motherless Brooklyn. The story was great, filled to the brim with twists and turns that were unexpected and deeply thought out. However, the most interesting and grasping part of the book was the main character Lionel. Watching Lionel and his outbursts due to Tourette's Syndrome makes the story completely unique. The character is so well developed and the tension is built very well due to his disorder. Parts of the book that would be boring and predictable are made tense and scatterbrained simply because Lionel is the main character. At one point he is sitting quietly in a Zen meditation session and certain elements of the story are coming together.

In a normal story it would be tense but not as tense as it is for Lionel who must suppress his urge to scream out the flow of words that stampede his mind during this peaceful meditation. It isn't just that the reader knows Lionel wants to burst out, instead you read each individual thought he wants to scream. It's truly an excellent and unique read.

To keep this post from going on too long I'll just post a video of Jimmy Fallon, who was at Hofstra on September 25th. He was great, big props to him for getting Hofstra's president to say "Balls in your mouth", and was incredibly down to earth as well.